This years Women as Leaders conference on Tuesday 2 November, which was sponsored by Seasons and Per Aquum, hit the mark once again and gave the delegates a great opportunity to hear from some of the best business women in the UK today.
From a variety of sectors and businesses the speakers included Julie Meyer who took her business from start up to $50 million within two years, and the recently promoted Jill McDonald, now CEO of McDonald’s UK.
Themes from the day included:
- Be ruthless about your work/life balance. The only one who can decide your work/life balance is you. Ann Pickering – Group HR Director of O2
- How do you launch a global business? By making it in everybody’s interest for you to succeed. And don’t let not having money stop you from doing anything, capital follows ideas. If you can communicate your ideas – the money comes. Julie Meyer – Founder & CEO of Ariadne Capital
- Your stretch is never greater than your reach You can achieve whatever you set out to do, set yourself challenging goals and you will reach them. Don’t just take the safe career choices. Lisa Dowding – Customer Service and Logistics Director Procter & Gamble
- The fear is in the thinking not the doing Highlighted the importance of not letting your personal mental blocks get in the way of your success. Debbie Jevans – Director of Sports London 2012
- How do you maximise the contribution of women? Create a strong leadership culture, networks and role models for women. Confidence is the key to success for an individual and an organization. Jill McDonald – UK CEO of McDonald’s
- It is critical to have a good support system around you You need to have people in your life who can challenge and support you. Leadership is ultimately about being consistent & helpful in explaining complexities that look simple from an external perspective. Julie Southern – Chief Commercial and Financial Officer of Virgin Atlantic
And if that isn’t enough food for thought, you can also revisit the review from 2009’s Women as Leaders Conference as well.
The IoD Women as Leaders conference is being held on Wednesday 9 November 2011. For more details visit www.iod.com/womenasleaders
The issue of Board composition by gender remains a hot topic and an entirely relevant one to our resolving our current problems. We work with leaders assessing their behaviours and how these influence the quality of climate in their organisations. We also measure attributes of personality, which has such a huge impact upon how people behave. A little while ago, two very senior leaders, one female and one male, asked if our databases showed any significant difference between men and women and their personalities. It does and in many ways the natural predispositions of women are far better suited to being an inclusive and collaborative leader. You can read more at http://www.glowinkowski.com/img/Approach-and-Toolkit/GPI/Impact-of-Gender.pdf We are keen that this research adds vitality to the debate and highlights the need for organisations to operate effective recruitment and selection practices to their Boards and senior management teams rather than have to work under the yolk of positive discrimination. Do feel free to contact me, david.physick@glowinkowski.com, to extend the discussion afforded by the findings of our research.
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